Why does God care at all?
Inspired by the cock debate...
Let's consider scale... first size
I am two metres tall (rounded)
The Earth is 13,000 km in diameter (average, rounded)
The solar system is 50,000 AU wide
The galaxy is 100,000 light years wide
So I am one 7,500,000th of the Earth's size
one 750,000,000,000th of the Solar System's size
one 900,500,000,000,000,000th of our galaxy's size
And that's without going into the known universe...
Number
I am one 6,000,000,000th of the population of the world
By contrast there are 1,000,000,000 bacteria on one person's skin
Age
I will live about 80 years
Humans have been around 130,000 years
The Earth has been around 4,540,000,000 years
The universe is about 14,000,000,000 years old
I will exist for one 2,000th of the time humans have been around (approximate)
I will exist for one 60,000,000th of the time of the Earth (approximate)
I will exist for one 2 billionth of the age of the universe (approximate)
Now to move on from numbers, as I have likely bored anyone who had time enough to read them all. Think of the scale of the numbers involved, billions, trillions even quintillions (A million million millions). Does that not make you feel kind of small? The brain cannot even process this kind of numerology, our brains stop before we even reach 100 and then just start thinking "many, many many, lots and lots and lots of many!" rather like the trolls of Pratchett.
Why should God care? Compared to the universe our lifespan lasts about the same time as it takes for us to blink twice compared to our lifespan. Tiny, absolutely minuscule. In size we are so small we would require being one of ten supremely powerful world leaders to be capable of effecting the Earth itself, and even then we require the manpower of many millions. We have managed no more then shifting soil on an interplanetary level, and the solar system hasn't noticed we're here yet. The chance of us effecting our galaxy is next to none.
Why should God care? We're irrelevant, absolutely pointless blinking dots flashing limply in a firework display. He has a universe to look after, as well as many other possible sentient species, many of whom may be vastly more successful then our own. If our entire species died out, life on Earth would remain quite unchanged, possibly even unaware of our disappearance, and our legacy would vanish within a century. If the Earth itself imploded, destroying God's "great work". Nothing much would change but the moon, which would have quite a fit as it crashes into nearby objects. The solar system would keep revolving and the galaxy would hurtle on without any change at all.
Quite simply, the chance of God paying any more attention to us then the seat you are sitting on, and the fleas inhabiting it, is as close to nil as to render the question insignificant. Men of old created a figure who pays attention to these blinks and their petty needs in an egotistical fit, human nature to make themselves center of the universe.
To just give yourself a realisation of how pointless we are. Attempt to count your blinks for the rest of your life, their precise form and nature, cause and speed. At the same time pay attention to the very tip of your very central eyelash (use a mirror if necessary), and try and guess which direction it wants to go.
Sound pointless? So are we
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Originally Posted by Exarch
I forgot what I was talking about.
